Halfway
by BRMCluv
Summary: AU. Liberated by Darken Rahl's death during her training to become a Mord-Sith, a young girl is trapped in a limbo, a halfway point to complete madness. The road back to sanity will be a long one.


No copyright infringement intended.

* * *

She is trembling, now.

The regal D'Haran stagecoach was built to spaciously seat about six or seven, so the five current passengers are able to spread out. Hally is careful to pick a seat far away from Sophia, but it does not help the fact that every time Sophia closes her eyes she sees Hally, once again at the other end of a merciless Agiel. She knows sleep will therefore not be an option on the long journey to Adyndril.

Someone hands her a blanket. She does not look at whoever it is, only wordlessly takes it and wraps it around her shoulders. They had to flee from the People's Palace too quickly for her to dress. She's still in anything but the blood-stained rags she'd worn all through that eventful day.

They start to move. She leans back against the cushioned seat and stares at the ceiling. Behind her eyes she is living it all again.

_At first she cried. When her mother was being broken she cried through the whole ordeal. She screamed and tugged at her chains and cursed Hally as she tortured Sophia's mother. It took hours upon hours. Sophia screamed long past her mother did, who eventually lost her voice and could only rasp. When at last her mother died, Hally allowed Sophia to weep over her body for a few minutes. When Hally and a few other Mord-Siths led Sophia's mother away, she dried her tears and made a decision._

"You OK?"

Sophia blinks as her memories come to a pause. Slowly, cautiously, she allows the Mord-Sith next to her a glance. She knows it isn't Hally -- Hally's voice haunts both her dreams and waking life. She knows that one well. It is another woman, with dark hair and darker eyes, almost black. They scare Sophia. She quickly looks away and does not answer.

The woman, Raina, shakes her head.

"Alright." But she does not move. Sophia turns her eyes back to the ceiling.

_She cried herself to sleep that night, thinking only of her father. She went through every single memory she had of him, she dreamed of his face and loving arms every second she was asleep. But upon rising the next morning, she honored the decision she made yesterday as she watched her dead, bloody mother being dragged away. She would not cry today._

_"I'm sorry, Daddy." she told him. Hally slapped her across the face with the Agiel for talking, sending her sprawling across the floor. Sophia did not cry out, only picked herself up and stepped closer to her father. He looked at her with utter dissapointment. She felt a lump rise in her throat and willed herself not to cry. She leveled herself with her father's eyes and looked deep into them. "I have to get to a place where they can't hurt me anymore, Daddy. That means I have to kill you." He did not flinch. She began._

"She's not talking?" Another voice. Someone else has moved next to Raina. Sophia listens carefully. She does not recognize this woman's voice either.

Raina shakes her head. The other woman, Berdine, sighs. There is silence for a few minutes as the stagecoach rolls along. "What does this mean?"

"Father Rahl's death?" she asks. Berdine nods. "I guess it means...we're free?" Raina answers.

A slow smile lights up Berdine's face. "I meant everyone." Raina says sternly, but there's a smile in her voice. Sophia listens but does not process their words. She is beyond caring, only wishes they would be quiet so she can return to her thoughts.

"So...no Father Rahl around to care if I do this?" She grabs Raina's wrist and turns her hand over, intertwining their fingers. Raina flinches, feeling a combination of nervousness and excitement. She is used to worrying about Father Rahl seeing.

Sophia hears this exchange feels Raina flinch beside her. She becomes curious as to what they're doing, so she again turns her head cautiously to look down at Raina's lap. She sees them holding hands and does not think anything of it. She knows that it is due to the terrible apathy that she has adopted, allowing her to kill her father only a short while ago.

_Sophia knew her father was close to the edge. He could no longer lift his head. His breaths were short and they rattled from deep within his chest. His entire body was soaked in blood. Sophia was sweaty and breathless from her work. She could feel Hally's eyes on her back, who sat in the corner, watching as Sophia prepared to twist the Agiel one final time. Slowly, she brought it up to the left side of her father's chest. Footsteps sounded in the hall, but they stirred neither Sophia nor Hally as she brought the Agiel up slowly. She dragged it lightly along her father's stomach. He tensed and gasped but did not cry out. Finally, it reached the spot where his heart fluttered and struggled to beat regularly under his bloodied skin._

_The door behind them burst open. "Stop!" someone screamed. It did not reach Sophia's ears. She was at the height of her concentration. The voice kept screaming, but the words were unrecognizable to Sophia. She closed her eyes and twisted the Agiel around as far as it would go. Father screamed, but not for long. Daughter listened, and felt nothing._

_There were hands on her shoulders. There was the floor as she was thrown backward onto it. There was a crack as her head snapped back and hit stone. There were people dressed in red running forward and grabbing at her father's body, feeling his neck. There was Hally, unchaining him and throwing him to the floor, putting her mouth on his, pounding on his chest._

_It was futile. He was gone. Silence, and Sophia broke it as she stood up and cleared her throat. She had not spoken so much as a word in hours. Every face in the room turned to hers. _

_"Why?" she asked in a calm, serene voice that sounded strange to her own ears. More silence, until one of the women on the floor spoke up._

_"Rahl is dead."_

Sophia realizes she is still staring at Berdine and Raina's hands. They do not seem to notice, each thinking their own thoughts. Sophia looks beyond them and sees, from across the coach, Hally. A blonde woman is beside her, talking, but Hally does not seem to be listening. She's looking at Berdine and Raina holding hands, brow furrowed. Sophia feels herself freeze as she looks at Hally's eyes. Her tormenter looks up, and they lock eyes. Sophia feels unable to move under that gaze. Her throat is bone-dry as that voice echoes in her head. She swallows painfully. She cannot read Hally's eyes nor her expression. Both are blank. Cara, the woman next to Hally, says something that Sophia does not hear. Hally turns back to her friend, and Sophia is finally able to move.

She wraps the blanket tighter around herself. She leans back. Her eyes feel heavy, her lids dip and close. Sophia lets them. She feels sleep tugging at her tired muscles. She relaxes them completely and feels the apathy rise within her again.

Time wears on. The other women in the coach are silent now, alone with their own thoughts. Sophia's mind wanders, her thoughts become more abstract as sleep aproaches. Sophia becomes drowsier and drowsier, and just as her mind and body approach sleep, she thinks of Hally and panicks at the last moment.

She engages in a silent battle with the approaching sleep, deciding she will stay awake after all. This causes the paralysis to deepen, freezing its victim and whispering in her ears. _Hally's voice!_ she thinks, and the panic swirls behind her eyes. She tries to twist and thrash and awaken herself further. Slowly the paralysis wears off and she can let out her breath.

She does not understand that the paralysis and auditory hallucinations are natural side effects of wrenching herself out of sleep.

_It's Hally's fault_, she thinks. _She's haunting me_.

The stagecoach slows and rolls to a stop as they arrive in Adyndril.


End file.
